Tag Archives: NORML

PNC Bank announces closure of MPP accounts

One of the nation’s leading marijuana legalization groups says PNC Bank has notified it that it will close the organization’s 22-year-old accounts, a sign of growing concerns in the financial industry that the Trump administration will crack down on the marijuana business in states that have legalized it.

The Marijuana Policy Project (MPP) lobbies to eliminate punishments for marijuana use but is not involved in growing or distributing the drug — an important distinction for federally regulated banks and other institutions that do business with such advocacy groups.

Nick Field, the MPP’s chief operating officer, said a PNC Bank representative told him in May that the organization’s accounts would be permanently closed July 7 because an audit of the accounts revealed that the organization received funding from marijuana businesses that handle the plant directly.
“They told me it is too risky. The bank can’t assume the risk,” Field said.

PNC Bank declined to discuss its relationship with the MPP, but a spokeswoman said that “as a federally regulated financial institution, PNC complies with all applicable federal laws and regulations.”

The bank has held the MPP’s accounts since the organization was formed in 1995.

Some advocacy groups say the abrupt closing of the MPP’s accounts is an unpleasant side effect of growing uncertainty about protections for the marijuana industry in states that have legalized it. The industry enjoys loose protection via a combination of legislative amendments and memos from the Justice Department that effectively allow states to operate medical and recreational marijuana businesses without federal interference. But many advocates worry that the Trump administration is changing course to enforce federal laws and dismantle key protections for the expanding industry.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions is a longtime opponent of marijuana legalization. During a Senate drug hearing in April 2016, Sessions — then a Republican senator from Alabama — said, “We need grown-ups in charge in Washington to say marijuana is not the kind of thing that ought to be legalized, it ought not to be minimized, that it’s in fact a very real danger.”

When asked during his confirmation hearing in January whether he would enforce federal drug laws as attorney general, Sessions replied, “I won’t commit to never enforcing federal law.”
The Justice Department did not respond to requests for comment.

Last week, Sessions wrote to congressional leaders asking for the ability to prosecute medical-marijuana dispensaries. Sessions implored members of Congress to reconsider a rule enacted in 2014 to prevent the Justice Department from using federal funds to block state laws that legalize medical-marijuana cultivation and use.

Legal marijuana is protected by the “Cole memo”

The sale of recreational marijuana, in contrast, is loosely protected by the 2013 “Cole memo.” The memo, issued by Deputy Attorney General James M. Cole during the Obama administration, instructs state law enforcement agencies not to use their resources to prosecute the authorized sale of marijuana in states where it is legal.

The vice president for regulatory compliance at the American Bankers Association says these protections are not enough reassurance for financial institutions. Banks are subject to federal regulation to prevent fraud, money laundering or breaches of privacy.

“We are a registered 501(c)(3) and (c)(4). We have yearly audits. We are compliant with the IRS,” he said. “It doesn’t get any clearer than that.”

Field said the MPP is still seeking a new bank. John Hudak, an expert on marijuana policy and governance at the Brookings Institution, suspects that the MPP’s difficulty in finding another bank reflects banks’ fears that Sessions intends to roll back protections for the industry and enforce the federal Controlled Substances Act.
“It’s no secret,” Hudak said. “It’s a situation that is creating an increasingly uncertain policy environment.”

The first provision of the bill would prevent federal regulators from terminating banks’ federal deposit and share insurance “solely because the depository institution provides or has provided financial services to a cannabis-related legitimate business.”

Many marijuana advocacy organizations hope the bill will pass, offering the industry the banking security it seeks.
“It’s one thing to take a position about making marijuana legal,” said Mason Tvert, the MPP’s communications director. “It’s something different to say these businesses should be able to be bank legitimately.”

What You Should Know about the Politics Behind the CBD Miracle Claims

The CBD miracle may be a mirage. The push for legalization has been greatly aided by the unfortunate cases of young children with seizure disorders. No one wants to see a child suffer. Especially the child’s parents. Desperate for pain relief for their beloved child, these parents are easily convinced that a yet untested drug may offer hope.

Opportunistic groups like Marijuana Policy Project, Americans for Safe Access, Drug Policy Alliance and NORML make lobbying visits to state legislators and other parents of extremely sick children. They argue that refusal to legalize marijuana is to deny these parents and their child hope. This is one of the most effective strategies they have found to open the minds and prey on the sympathies of our legislators. This is a critical step to advance their drug policy agenda.

Another claim these legalization advocates often make, is that marijuana is a victim-less drug and that it has killed no one.

Yet, a deeper look at both of the above arguments finds that marijuana doesn’t necessarily help the extreme cases of childhood illness and that child patients who have tried medical marijuana have indeed died. See Marijuana Oils Misleading Promises.

Unfortunately, the lawyers and lobbyists for the marijuana industry don’t want the facts to get in their way of opening up more markets and creating more customers.

Parents need the whole truth, though. They have a right to know about the limits of our scientific knowledge about CBD oil and the limits of its effectiveness. They also need to be informed of the possibility it will not save the life of their child. Or even improve it. See Right to Know about CBD.

A Look at the History of this Campaign

In the late 70’s NORML activists joked about their need of the ‘medical’ benefits of marijuana. In this video, you will hear them plotting to push for marijuana as a medicine which they believed (quite rightly) would eventually lead to the right to get full legal access.

Watch the Video

You see, these drug users don’t care a whit about sick children. They are not truly seeking a cure. By the time science catches up to the scam, they plan to have full legalization accomplished. They just want the right to do their drug of choice without the guilt of drug dealers going to jail on their behalf. Or, the stigma of being illicit drug users. Or the danger of having to do a back alley deal with an unsavory character to get their ‘high.’

The drug legalizers know that calling “pot” medical is nothing more than a political gambit. They have always known it. They also are well aware of the negative outcomes of marijuana use but they keep those quiet. Read more: Medical the Strategic Plan for Legalization.

Under its influence, this drug makes people extremely political, according to Dr. Ed Gogek, an addiction expert and author of Marijuana Debunked. He says, “Pot users are relentlessly political. It’s an effect of the drug, not a rational decision.”

Parents of drug abusing children will hear their child rattle off all the arguments of the Pro-pot lobbyists, “But mom, its only marijuana, it’s not addictive, it’s just an herb, it’s harmless, it’s never killed anyone” etc.

Are they parroting the drug dealers or is it the drug itself talking?

CBD Miracle Cure Often Fails to Deliver

True medicine goes through rigorous scientific testing and approval processes. It is packaged in carefully controlled doses, and packaged with labels and package inserts which specify contraindications, side effects, warnings and dosing instructions.

None of the marijuana products being currently sold by state approved dispensaries can say the same. This leaves care giving parents buying ‘snake oil,’ taking chances and performing their own medical experiments on their own child. This should not be. A recent article on Buzz Feed, The Dark Side of Medical Marijuana’s Miracle Drug, tells several such stories and about the disillusionment that follows.